CASTINE, Maine – Maine Maritime Academy women's lacrosse scored two last minute goals to defeat Nichols College 15-13 on Tuesday evening in non-conference action on Ritchie Field.

With the victory the Mariners improve to 5-4 on the season, while the Bison fall to 4-8 overall. Maine Maritime returns to action on Saturday, April 21 when they travel to take on Colby-Sawyer College for a North Atlantic Conference matchup at 1:00 pm.

Prior to the game the Mariners honored their two senior players Morgan Libby (Brunswick, Maine) and Shelby O'Neil (Bar Harbor, Maine).

Sydney Adams (Trumbull, Conn.) put the Mariners on the board first at 27:43, but the Bison answered back with a goal of their own at 24:24. Adams added another goal to give the Mariners a momentary 2-1 lead, but once again the Bison evened things up and scored less than a minute later to take their first lead of the game with 20:32 to go. 

O'Neil and Madison Savary (Bath, Maine) swapped goals for Maine Maritime back and forth twice to put the Mariners ahead 6-3 with 14:14 to go in the first half. Adams, Savary, and O'Neil each added another goal in the final 10 minutes of the half to send the Mariners into halftime with a 9-6 lead.

The Bison scored back-to-back goals to start the second half and cut the deficit to 9-8, but Adams added another goal to stretch the Mariners' lead to 10-8. Nichols added a free position goal from Mellissa LeFleur to close the gap to one, but Madison Barry (Stoneham, Mass.) and Libby scored back-to-back goals for the Mariners to make it 12-9 with 14:08 to play. The Bison outscored the Mariners 4-1 entering the final five minutes of play but Savary picked up an unassisted goal with 45 seconds left to give the Mariners a one-goal lead and Barry added a goal with five seconds left to secure the 15-13 victory. 

Savary led the Mariners with four goals, two draw controls, an assist and a ground ball, Adams added four goals, three ground balls, three draw controls, and a game-high three caused turnovers and O'Neil also chipped in with four goals, a ground ball and a draw control. Barry added two goals and a ground ball while Libby added the other goal for the Mariners to go along with a team-high four ground balls, three draw controls and a caused turnover.

Lindsay O'Connell led all players with five goals, nine draw controls, a ground ball and a caused turnover, LeFleur added four goals, eight draw controls, and four ground balls, and Rachel Birmingham and Miranda Smith each added a pair of goals. 

In net, Sierra James (Campton, N.H.) was impressive, stopping 19 shots in the victory for the Mariners, while Emily Eagan stopped three shots in nearly 27 minutes of play and teammate Molly Steen tallied two saves in just over 33 minutes of play. 

Nichols tallied 21 draw controls compared to the Mariners' nine, while both teams scooped up 19 ground balls. The Mariners went 5-for-6 on free position shots, while the Bison went 6-for-13.